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Must McLaren Accept Reality of F1 - That if You Want Win, You Can't Always Be Fair?

The McLaren team are fully conscious of the difficulty they encounter with Max Verstappen and Red Bull in the championship battle this year, but they don't believe to modify their strategy to running the team.

They will continue to provide both drivers the optimal opportunity they can and operate the team on a foundation of fairness and equanimity.

"This represents the manner we plan competing. This is the way in which we tackle racing, and we aim to remain equitable, and we want to maintain equal treatment to both drivers."

Team boss Andrea Stella is a veteran of many title battles. He won the championship as race engineer to Raikkonen in the 2007 season when the Ferrari driver made up seventeen points under the old scoring system in two Grands Prix to win the title, while McLaren collapsed.

And he lost the championship as engineer to Fernando Alonso in 2010, when Ferrari messed up their strategy at the last Grand Prix of the season and enabled Vettel and Red Bull to snatch the title from under their noses.

Stella stated following the race in Texas: "We look at the remaining five Grands Prix as chances to increase the gap on Max. And when it involves having to make a decision as to a driver, this will exclusively be determined by the numbers."

"We rely on the past experience. I can remember at least 2007, 2010, in which you go to the last race and it's in fact the [driver in] third [place] that wins the championship. So we're not going to make decisions unless this is closed by the calculations."

Why Did McLaren Stop Upgrades on This Year's Car?

All teams this season have had to face the conundrum of for how long to focus on their 2025 car while also ensuring they are as prepared as they can be for the major rules overhaul coming for 2026.

In Formula 1, it's usually the case that if a constructor gets it wrong at the start of a new regulation period, it can take a long time to recover. And if they get it right, that advantage can last for a while - look at the Red Bull team in 2022 and 2023, the most recent occasion the regulations changed.

McLaren started this year with the best car, after putting a lot of technical development into their 2025 design.

They did continue to improve it for a while, but were experiencing diminishing returns. So when evaluating the bang for buck they were getting on their 2025 season car compared to 2026, it became an easy choice to redirect attention to next year.

The Red Bull team have closed the gap since bringing their new floor and front wing at the Italian Grand Prix, but the McLaren remains competitive - team principal Andrea Stella stated he believed Lando Norris had the pace to challenge for the win in Texas had he not finished following Leclerc.

"We just have to continue optimising the car performance and keep executing strong weekends. And from this perspective, if you think of a Grand Prix like Baku City Circuit, we didn't maximise the car's potential and we didn't deliver a perfect race."

"Therefore we have a significant opportunity, and the result of this championship and the driver's title is in our hands. It's not placed in someone else's hands."

Driver Transfers: How Challenging Is It to Switch Teams?

First of all, I'm not sure the inquiry has an completely correct premise. It's true that both Lewis Hamilton and Sainz had slightly sticky opening phases of the season, in different ways, and that they are now faring much better.

Carlos Sainz and Alex Albon do now look very even. However, it's less certain that, in Hamilton's case, he is currently the "match" of Charles Leclerc - or not consistently, at least.

Hamilton has failed to outperform Leclerc very often at all this year, either in qualifying sessions or race.

He is now significantly nearer than he previously. He is consistently qualifying within a few hundredths of a second of Leclerc, but in qualifying it's 4-2 to Leclerc since the mid-season break.

This last weekend in Texas, on one of Lewis Hamilton's preferred tracks, he was a second behind Leclerc when the Monegasque completed his pit stop, and dropped thirteen seconds over the rest of the race.

Looking back, Leclerc was on the best strategy. Nevertheless, over the season, and even currently, it's difficult to claim that on average Charles Leclerc has not been the superior Ferrari racer this year.

Both Lewis Hamilton and Carlos Sainz have discussed how difficult it is to change constructors, and we have to take them at their word.

Hamilton would not claim even now that he was fully adapted to Ferrari - and he is hoping the regulation changes next year will suit him; he has never particularly liked these ground-effect vehicles.

There is a great deal for a racing driver to get their head around when they switch teams, as Hamilton has described repeatedly this season. But not every driver faces difficulties in this way.

Fernando Alonso, for instance, was on it from the beginning of the 2023 when he transferred to the Aston Martin team. And would Verstappen struggle if he changed constructors? I believe most in Formula 1 would anticipate he wouldn't.

How Soon Can We Determine Next Year's Team Performance?

Until the F1 cars run for the first time in pre-season testing next year, no-one will understand how the teams are looking in the upcoming season.

The first test, in Barcelona on January 26-30, is behind closed doors because the constructors wanted to get their heads around their initial track time of the power unit changes without the scrutiny of the media.

So the two tests in Bahrain on February 11-13 and 18-20 February will be the first time a certain indication of comparative speed emerges.

But, as always, it's only at the season opener that the true and accurate situation will emerge.